Northern Illinois University's plan to build a $160-million cancer-zapping machine in the western suburbs is stalled, and along with it the school's quest to become a player in the Chicago-area medical market.

Northern Illinois University's plan to build a $160-million cancer-zapping machine in the western suburbs is stalled, and along with it the school's quest to become a player in the Chicago-area medical market.

With no financial backing, construction on the West Chicago site where an NIU affiliate wants to build a proton-therapy center has been frozen for a year now, despite repeated assurances to state regulators that thawing credit markets would help the center line up financing.

The project is now certain to miss a state-imposed March deadline for completion. That means the NIU-affiliated firm likely will have to seek permission to restart construction from an unpredictable state panel that regulates big-ticket medical facilities. Meanwhile, work is humming along on a rival facility in nearby Warrenville that could begin treating patients within a year.

The financial and regulatory hurdles jeopardizing the NIU project threaten the DeKalb school's efforts to put itself on the map as a research hub in a burgeoning, albeit controversial, area of medicine. NIU's plan to treat patients through a pact with the Northwestern Medical Faculty Foundation, which would provide radiation oncologists to staff the facility, also is at risk.

A rival facility nearby could begin treating patients within a year.

John Lewis, executive director of the Northern Illinois Proton Treatment & Research Center, referred questions to a spokesman.

"The commitment is still there to build a facility, but clearly it's taking a long time to get it done," the spokesman says. "The timing has been terrible with the credit markets."

NIU backed a $15-million line of credit to begin construction, which was halted in January. The proton center got state approval last year to issue up to $200 million in bonds to fund the project, but the underwriter, J. P. Morgan Securities Inc., hasn't been able to sell them, the spokesman says.

Although NIU isn't financing the facility, the project "adds substantial risk" to the state university's balance sheet "given its close affiliation with the project, the amount of leverage associated with the facility and the complexity and expense," New York-based Moody's Investors Service said in a May report. The university guaranteed the short-term financing, but it won't back any debt floated to build the facility, Moody's says.

The center continues to work with J. P. Morgan while weighing options on the state deadline, the spokesman says. Missing the deadline likely would force the center to seek a "certificate of need" from the Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board, which would require convincing that a second proton facility is necessary.

No decision has been made as to whether the firm needs to do so, a board spokeswoman says.

Proton therapy uses beams to target cancer cells more precisely than traditional radiation treatment, resulting in less damage to surrounding tissue. It's used primarily on prostate cancer and tumors in children.

There are only six proton-therapy centers operating nationally and another four under construction, including the NIU-affiliated project and the one seven miles away, which is backed by a private company, New York-based ProCure Treatment Centers Inc., and will be run by Central DuPage Hospital.

While NIU officials worry over tight credit markets, some health care financiers see other risks. Many doctors believe the technology is unnecessary for all but a few rare procedures. In September, a federal report said more studies are needed to determine if proton therapy offers benefits over conventional radiation.

Given the competing facility and the unknown future of proton therapy, investors could be leery of NIU's project, says James Unland, president of Chicago-based consultant Health Capital Group.

"The usage factor for this technology is in question, so to have two of these places within a few miles of each other is ridiculous," Mr. Unland says.

NIU officials, who fought the ProCure project and claimed there was room for only one proton facility, now say there's plenty of demand to go around. The NIU center, which also would be used for research and testing of new uses for the high-tech beams, would treat up to 1,500 patients a year.

ProCure CEO Hadley Ford agrees. "I continue to think that this market can support multiple centers," he says. "Having them close together provides an opportunity to have the only place in the world that has that sort of proton capacity."

It's up to the NIU center to convince lenders of that.

"Right now, lenders need sure things," says Newton Juhng, a New York-based health care analyst at BB&T Capital Markets. "Cutting-edge, progressive technology that is in the very early stages isn't a sure thing."